The subject matter disclosed herein relates to turbomachinery, and more particularly, to predicting degradation rates of components of turbomachinery using condition-based monitoring.
Turbomachine systems (e.g., turbine systems) may include a variety of components and subsystems participating in a process. For example, a turbomachine may include a load, a shaft, a filter house, fuel lines, combustors, turbine, exhaust systems, and so forth. The components and subsystems may operate in conjunction to produce work output by spinning the shaft that drives the load (e.g., electric generator). Over time, the components and subsystems may degrade from use, accumulation of substances, or the like. For example, filters in a filter house of a turbine system may degrade by accumulating dust, thereby causing a pressure drop in an inlet duct structure that is undesirable. In another example, the compressor of a turbine system may also degrade by accumulating dust, thereby affecting the output of the turbine system. Oftentimes, maintenance of the components and subsystems may be statically scheduled. However, following a static schedule may lead to inefficient resource usage by replacing a component before it has actually reached a degraded state that affects the performance of the turbine system. Likewise, following the static schedule to replace a component after it has already reached a degraded state may result in operating inefficiencies and other compressor operation issues, such as vibration and reduction in surge margin, in the turbine system.